Ain't No Home for Me
by bleedingdaylight
Summary: The Winchesters have never known a real home. Except when Cas tells Dean otherwise.


Dean and Sam Winchester have never had a home. Sure, they lived in a nice, comfortable house in Lawrence once upon a time but that was so many years ago. Plus, neither of them remembered much. Well, Dean remembered some but Sam had no recollection of the house except for Azazel's reenactment of his mother's death and the beginning of all his problems as well as the case in which he saw his mother for the first time in a long time.

But Dean…Dean remembered the flames that heated up his face and his father's order. He remembered saying goodnight to his mother, hugging his father real tight and kissing Sammy on the forehead. He remembered throwing around a football with his dad in the yard. He remembered bits and pieces from that house. By he didn't associate it with home. Because that house was also full of despair and grief. It was nothing like a home to him.

The crappy motel rooms that they stayed at with their father and throughout the rest of their lives didn't even come close to the word "home," unless they wanted to associate it with questionable stains on the bed sheets and the smell of sex and hookers. Plus, they changed motels after every case, never staying a place to long so that they could form attachments with a particular place.

When Sam went to Stanford, he didn't feel at ease in the apartment he shared with Jessica. He felt like he didn't belong there, especially when Jess wasn't around. She made him feel at eased, relaxed. She made him feel comfortable and loved. She made him feel like he belonged. His outlet from his undesirable life as a hunter. She was the closest thing to a normal life that he had ever gotten. The closest thing to a home.

But Dean never had that. He never let anyone in enough to let them coddle him and make him feel loved. He had Cassie at one point but he lost her because of his lifestyle and then it repeated again with Lisa and Ben. He had lived a lie for a year and then Sammy came back and he was off again, no more house, no more white picket fence, no more domestication.

The Winchesters were always leaving. Never did they stay in the same place for too long. It never did them any good to. And anyway, with their lifestyle, hunting required more traveling then a freaking traveling salesman did. And with all of that, they never could find a home if they tried.

And when Dean told all of this to Cas, freaking _Castiel_, Angel of The Lord, no social skills, non-human Castiel, he disagreed with Dean. He said that a home wasn't a house, wasn't a building, wasn't a place. He said that home was where one feels safe. That home was was his family, Sam and Bobby, that home was everything that was close to him.

Home was Sam. Sam, his little brother, the one he swore he'd protect no matter what the no cost. Because Sam was his safe haven, the one that completed Dean. Where one went, the other one followed. Without each other, they were lost, the Winchesters. They had been operating co-dependently for so many years that they didn't know how to work alone.

Home was Bobby. Because Bobby was their surrogate father. Their tough-love provider because they'd lost their dad and didn't a kick in the ass every once in a while. Bobby, who gave the boys so much, and was gifted with their love and devotion, something that was extremely hard to come by, and Bobby recognized that.

Home was the Impala. Their dad, Sam and Dean's favorite car, the 1967 Chevy Impala. It was beautiful and black and made Dean the happiest man on earth when he knuckled the leather padding on the wheel or breathed in its comforting scent of beer, apple pie and newspaper ink. He's been with this car for so long, a constant in his life. It was his baby, his favorite thing right after pie. It was perfect in every way imaginable to Dean and he would need change it for the world.

And then there was Castiel. Cas was his home. Cas, who came into his life through the door of an abandoned barn, taking all the shotgun shells that Bobby and Dean shot at him without even flinching. So professional and emotionless he was back then. But then, he started to change, become more…human as he began to become close to Dean. And when he rebelled, Dean remembered the jolt of relief that shot up in him when he did. He remembered how he wished he could have kissed him at that moment. Because Castiel did it for Dean, betrayed his brothers for him and because of his doubts and Dean knew that Cas was there to stay.

Because he was the man—angel, rather—that recreated his soul after Hell, mended his broken bones and resculpted his body from scratch. He was Castiel's most remarkable masterpiece, even if he was a miserable, tortured soul inside. But Cas told him, when Dean was really particularly angst-y, that his soul shined bright, brighter than most souls. That it was most beautiful than anything he's ever seen.

So, Castiel was his home. He was at home when Cas didn't know when to stop talking. He was at home when he heard the rustle of Cas's wings. He was at home when Castiel didn't know the meaning of personal space. Dean was at home when Cas and him made out in the back of the Impala as Sam went to go check in for a room at the latest motel that they were staying at. He was especially at home when Castiel turned into a horny bastard, all thanks to Dean, and stuck his hand down Dean's pants after he made sure that Sam, or anyone else for that matter, wasn't looking. Cas was Dean's beacon that brightened the path of the future. Castiel was Dean's newfound hope in life. Cas was Dean's home, in every way and more, and Dean couldn't be more happy about it.


End file.
